The Arkansaw traveler., 1887-12-10

ing her metrical inflrmites, came very near marrying her-that is, l proposed and she rejected me in & poem of sixteen stanzas. She finally united in the holy bonds of matri- mony with a tinsmith, and, hope, gives him sonnets on toast every morning."
 "A nlce but determined old lady with an epic poem on the subject of Noah and his adventure was the worst of my troubles tor lon- time," said another editor. "She came in on the cars from the country one day, and asked me if would like to see the poem. replied with ill-starred po- liteness, Certainly and asked her how much there was of it. She replied about ten pounds, she guessed, stepped out into the hall and brought me the article, crammed into one of those old fashioned oilcloth valises. She stated that her handwriting was not very good and thought she had better read it aloud, and actually commenced giving me the whole affair, done up in quatrains. Not having time or nerve to listen to it then, unhappily told her to leave it, and would look it over with view to immediate publi- cation if it proved worthy. She wrote me almost every day for two months ii terrible, unreadable hand, and gave me the reputation in the office of receiving love letters from somebody. When tried to explain by showing the letters and the manuscript, mo- body could read either, and I was for some time under cloud of ridicule from my fellow editors.
 "I was just about to bundle up the whole business and send 1t back to my good old lady friend by express, when and destroyed among many other val uable things, the oilcloth satchel, the ark, Noah and all the animals, male and female.
 "The old lady came into town the next day to see if her epic was safe, and shall never forget how sorry was to be obliged to tell her it had vanished.
 She sank right down on the floor and wept piteously it was her life work from literary point of view. She had composed those lines amid the strokes of the churn, the feeding of the chickens and the cooking of boiled dinners, and had intended to go down through succeeding ages and weather the deluge of oblivion in that ark. She was perfectly overwhelmed with grief, but finally recovered sufficiently to de- mand $l 900 for her poetry-left in my care, and lost by carelessness, she said. She finally sued us; could not testify to the value or worthlessness of the manuscript, never having been able to read it, and finally compro- missed by paying her $20O, and my at torney Sl00 for getting me out of the scrape."
 "The worst volunteer contributor ever had to encounter" said another, was poetical retormer. He was a little, old man, who, 1 am afraid, was liable to be called by the name at tached to the business end of wind lass. He had great many peculiar theories of his own in regard to po- etry, and wanted me to devote de- partment to them in my paper. One ot his poems I did publish, on account of it's very absurdity.
 "iiis theory, as illustrated by this 'poein,' was, that as many poets wrote four line stanzas without rhyming the first and third, while the second and fourth were rhymed, it was just as proper to rhyme the first and third and let the others take care of them selves. The poem commenced like this:
 1t was a cold and winter night; The wind blew fresh and shrill; | woman sat by the dim relight; No other light had she.
 Through poverty and sad distress She'd struggled bravely on; But now her strength has grown much less, And food was very dear
 ".Alas! alas what shall do9 The woman loudly cried; | For of sweet children she had two, And loved them very much"
 "How many more stanzas had the poem, did you say?" inquired one of the editors, with mid winter polite ness.
 "I did not say," replied the other, but there were thirty-eight in aii." 70, God, she cried. in accents wild" But the narrator was alone. The remainder of his story had been "de- clined, with thanks."-NeW Fork Star.
 Good Time Coming and Don't You